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Study Island Best Practices: 6 Frequently Asked Questions Answered

Study Island Best Practices: 6 Frequently Asked Questions Answered

Friday, October 7, 2016

Edmentum’s Study Island is jam-packed with features, and all too often, we find that our users are only scratching the surface of what this solution can actually do. For example, did you know that Study Island is a powerful assessment tool featuring a customizable test builder that leverages our library of thousands of standards-based items? Listed below are a few of the questions we hear most often to help educators get the most out of this powerful classroom tool!

1. Can Study Island be used for more than test prep?

We hear this question often and the answer is a resounding yes! Study Island is a flexible, comprehensive tool for practice and assessment in the classroom. Intuitive reporting combined with engaging practice activities, including our popular selection of games, help students practice the specific skills that they need to work on – whether they’re at, above, or below grade level. Assessments can be fully customized and used for everything from quick classroom formative activities to district-level benchmarking. The program also helps facilitate collaboration in the classroom with included features to allow whole-group questioning (consider this the next evolution of the clicker system) and tools to help instructors easily group students. And, of course, questions built to your state standards and technology-enhanced item types like those on state assessments does make it an excellent tool to help your students prepare for high-stakes testing.

2. Wait—Study Island features a classroom clicker system?

Indeed it does! Study Island comes with a built-in clicker system called Group Sessions. This exciting tool is great for engaging whole-class lessons and real-time feedback. Group Sessions allow instructors to work through the program’s standards-based topics as a group by administering multiple-choice and technology-enhanced questions to students and collecting answers via clickers or their own devices. You will see responses immediately and get a pulse on your students’ level of understanding!

3. What’s Sensei for Study Island?

We like to think of Sensei as one of Study Island’s not-so-hidden gems. Included as a part of your subscription, Sensei is our robust, intuitive data dashboard that analyzes and presents student data in a visual manner to help educators make fast, effective instructional decisions. Wading through student data can be daunting—Sensei does that work automatically and provides charts, graphs, and visual cues that allow for easy progress monitoring and targeted instruction. We know that teachers spend a lot of time digging through their data in order to group students. The Sensei dashboard can be a huge time-saver for teachers to help expedite this process and make sure students receive the instruction they need.

4. How is Study Island content built?

When we say that content is built to state standards, we mean that we work backwards from actual state standards in order to create all Study Island content, including lessons, assessment items, and practice activities. Our in-house team of curriculum and subject-matter experts start by analyzing individual Common Core and state-specific standards. Then, they create a custom scope and sequence before creating any lesson content, practice activities, or assessment items. It’s a process we’ve worked hard to fine-tune!

5. Can Study Island be used in a station rotation model?

Yes! The program offers multiple options for targeted, individualized student practice—which makes it a great tool to use in a station rotation model! While some students are working directly with instructors to learn or review skills, you can use the program’s real-time data and flexible structure to create independent online practice activities. In yet another station, some students could be working on an offline project-based learning activity pulled from the Teacher Toolkit, and still others may be rewarded with the opportunity to play games during practice time. The best part? They’ll still be learning!

6. Does Study Island integrate with any rostering or LMS tools?

Study Island integrates with Clever, which makes keeping up-to-date rosters in Study Island a breeze for schools and districts already using the free platform. We’ve also built Study Island to be easily integrated with Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Student Information Systems (SIS) through our Application Programming Interface (API) to help our customers streamline their data. Finally, all of our content is mobile-optimized for easy use across different devices, including desktops, laptops, Chromebooks, iPads, tablets, and mobile phones.

Want to learn more about how Edmentum’s Study Island can support effective teaching and deepen learning in the classroom? Check out the new features we added this summer, or take a look at this Tips and Tricks Guide!